Problem: Many people will agree that for many children a simple “time out” or punishment by not watching TV or no candy simply won’t work. The rod accomplishes things much faster and better. But many will say that even the toughest and most stubborn child to teach can be taught without physical force, and could probably refer to many professionals who have dealt with such successfully. I clearly remember someone who said something along the lines of, “Yeah, ‘spare the rod, hate the child’: how many have beaten their kids to death or made them bleed and said that they were just doing it for the kid’s own good or that they didn’t realize they were going too far?”
Solution: To this I can only say that very few people could beat a child so severely that they could honestly say they were doing it for their own good and didn’t realize they went far. Of those very few none who really wanted to follow Proverbs’ teaching on discipline would repeat the beating so severely if at all. Most who beat their kids so severely and say this are simply making excuses for their violent and in that case anti-biblical behavior. And what about the success of professionals with even the most out of control kids? Unfortunately many of us aren’t experts or professionals nor have the time and money to hire one and this principle is simple enough in that it works and results in good. True, at the time it doesn’t seem very great for the child (Hebrews 12:11), but in the end they are better off to learn things that would drastically improve their lives as opposed to grow up unbeaten and unlearned. The bottom line is, just like Proverbs 22:15 says, the only purpose of such measures (when none others work) is to make the child learn and become smarter.
